The present invention relates to a lighting control system for residences and the like which includes a plurality of programmable lighting control modules and remote function switches linked together on a local area network.
Home lighting systems which are prewired into dwellings during the construction phase are becoming increasingly sophisticated. The single circuit mechanical light switch has been replaced by multichannel touch sensitive controllers which can control a plurality of lighting channels and which can provide dimming for selected channels so that a user can customize the lighting in a particular room from a single control panel. Systems of this type are disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,649,323 issued Mar. 10, 1987 entitled MICROCOMPUER-CONTROLLED LIGHT SWITCH and in U.S. Pat. No. 4,733,138 issued Mar. 22, 1988 entitled PROGRAMMABLE MULTICIRCUIT WALL-MOUNTED CONTROLLER. Not only may individual channels be controlled with the controllers described in the aforementioned U.S. Pat. Nos., but lighting levels for groups of channels may be stored in memory as preset levels which may be retrieved by the push of a single switch. These controllers are typically wired to control the lighting circuits in a single room or area.
It is also possible to link a plurality of lighting level controllers to a single central processing unit which includes a computer. The computer may be programmed to link several individual light controls in a particular group and place the group under control of a selected individual control within the group. Such a system is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,792,731 issued Dec. 20, 1988 entitled MULTI-ROOM CONTROLLER FOR INDIVIDUAL LIGHT CONTROLS. The system of this patent includes a centrally located control panel which may be used to control the various individual room or area lighting controls and group them as desired. A drawback of this design is that all programming must be accomplished at the central control unit. If the central control unit experiences a failure, the entire lighting system fails because all of the individual lighting control units are dependent upon the commands from the central controller in order to function. Also, the remote lighting control units lack the ability to program the central controller or to control each other except through the central controller.